


The Bubble

by someofthissomeofthat11011



Category: Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda - Becky Albertalli
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-29
Updated: 2018-05-29
Packaged: 2019-05-15 15:29:28
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,207
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14793113
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/someofthissomeofthat11011/pseuds/someofthissomeofthat11011
Summary: Takes place from Bram’s POV. He and Garrett overhear Simon and Martin in the parking lot. Bram makes an impulsive decision.





	The Bubble

**** “I'm supposed to get to decide that. I'm supposed to decide when and where and who knows and how they find out. That's supposed to be my thing. And you took that away from me! And what's worse is you brought Blue into this. He didn't fucking deserve that!” I freeze. Even if he hadn’t brought up Blue, I would have recognized that voice anywhere.

“It's not like he means that much to you, right? And look, I didn’t tell anyone his name, so it’s not like he has anything to worry about. I don’t even know his name,” Martin tries to rationalize. I frown. Martin is the one that had created that post? But why?

“You don't know anything about me, do you? That’s probably what made it so easy for you to screw up my life. I loved him and now, thanks to you, he's gone. So do me a favor and get the fuck away from me!” Simon shouts.

I know Garrett must be looking at me curiously, because I've lost the ability to keep walking. My mind is reeling from what Simon just said. Love. He said love. I heard him. With my ears. He said love. It’s impossible. He can’t love me. We’ve only ever emailed. But he said it. He definitely said love. 

I’ve had this argument with myself for weeks and knowing that Simon loves me makes me feel like my whole world is slowing down. A single fact seems to resonate within me: he feels the same way I do.

I don’t know when I made the decision to do so, but I find myself walking towards Simon. I can see him crying in the driver’s seat of his car and that spurs me forward. I think I told Garrett I would see him later, but I can’t remember.

The closer I get to Simon, the harder my heart thumps. I open his passenger door and slide into the seat. “What the hell?” He asks. Too late, I realize that I probably should have announced myself some way. Maybe by knocking on the window or something, but that can’t be helped now.

“Drive,” I say. I hope that I don’t sound too creepy.

Simon studies me for a minute. I can’t make myself turn to look at him. I need more time to figure out what to say to him. I don’t know what he sees when he stares at me, but after a moment he reverses out of the spot. “Where are we going?” He asks me when he gets to the stop sign at the end of the parking lot.

I frown. I hadn’t really thought that far ahead. This is why I don’t make impulsive decisions. I never know what to do once I start. I’m a planner through and through. “Wherever you want,” I say softly.

Simon looks at me hesitantly. “I don’t want to go home.” His voice sounds broken and it makes my chest feel tight.

“We can go to my place,” I offer. My mom isn’t home so that does seem like the ideal way of getting some privacy. 

Simon drives to my house and at first it surprises me that he knows how to get there. Then I remember that he was here for the Halloween party. He pulls up to the curb and gets out. I start to panic. I live over 10 minutes from the school, but in that time I don’t figure out what I want to say to him. It takes me over a minute to unlock my front door because my hands are shaking so badly.

When we cross the threshold, Simon looks at me expectantly, but I remain silent. “Are you going to tell me why you kidnapped me?” He sounds a little frustrated. I guess I can’t really blame him. I’d be annoyed if someone got in my car and lured me to their house… I’m actually surprised that I got him this far because when I think it in my head it sounds like the start of a horror movie.

I close my eyes and remind myself that he said he loved me. My heart thumps erratically, reminding me that he’s not the only one with thoughts of love in his head. “It’s my birthday,” I say after a long time.

“Happy birthday?” He says confused.

“No. Not today. January 18th,” I whisper. I don’t know why I chose that to explain. There are a lot of things I could have said. I could have told him my parents are divorced and I’m Jewish. I could have told him that I wholeheartedly agree with him that oreos are the best. I could have even picked up where we left off and told him that I’m not going to disappear, not after what I heard him say to Martin. But I didn’t choose any of those.

He looks at me confused. “So your birthday is in two weeks?” He confirms.

“January 18th. 118.” I don’t supply any other information. If that doesn’t help him understand what I’m trying to say then he really doesn’t want it to be me.

I study him as he processes my words. He doesn’t look like he understands them at first, but the moment he does, his eyes widen. “Bluegreen118,” he says breathlessly. “That’s you.”

I nod. “Blue comes from Bram Louis. Then Greenfeld,” I further explain. 

“I’m such an idiot,” he mutters. He looks deep in thought for a moment. “But the night of your party… the girl.” His eyebrows are knit together in confusion. I hate to admit it, but he looks really cute as he’s trying to understand this.

“I was drunk and confused,” I say guiltily. It’s not a good excuse, but a good excuse doesn’t really exist. “It ended like a minute after you saw us.” Suddenly a horrible thought crosses my mind. It’s too horrible to put words to, but that doesn’t stop it from making me panic. What if this changes things? What if he doesn’t love me now that he knows who I am? Or what if what he saw on Halloween is too much for him.

My breath hitches in my throat and my emotions must be playing out on my face, because Simon fixes me with a piercing look and he smiles. When I look at that smile, I feel like a weight has been lifted off of my heart. “I can’t believe you’re Blue. This is incredible! All this time, I’ve been trying to figure out who you were and it’s been you all along. I wanted it to be you, you know. At your Halloween party, I was actually going to tell you who I was.” It’s impossible to doubt him.

“You’re not mad?” I ask uncertainly. I feel like I would have been furious if I had seen him kiss a girl… then again, I have. For two nauseating months, Carys sat at our lunch table our sophomore year and pretty much draped herself over him everyday. I’d had a pretty epic crush on Simon at that point, so I remember every minute of it. So maybe I do understand where he’s coming from.

“Why would I be mad?” he asks me surprised.

“The party. And then today at school, I did nothing,” I point out to him. I felt like he had every right to be furious with me. I had watched with the whole cafeteria as Aaron and Spencer had jumped up on the table and made fun of him.

“You climbed into my car and kidnapped me. That’s something,” he assures me. He frowns. “I don’t care if you don’t want to be out yet; believe me - I don’t even want to be out yet. so that doesn’t make a difference to me. I do need to know what you want though.”

“I want to be with you, but you’re right. I’m not ready to be out yet,” I say honestly. I feel my face getting hot. “I heard you when you were talking… er, screaming at Martin.”

Simon looks like he’s replaying that conversation in his head. It makes him chew on his lip and frown. I can see that he doesn’t remember and I have no intention of reminding him. “You seemed upset at the thought that I would be gone from your life. Do you want me to be gone?” It’s not the most eloquent way of asking my question, but it’s the best I can manage.

“No. I don’t want you to go anywhere.” And then it happens. He doesn’t announce it, doesn’t ask for my permission. He just leans in and allows his lips to brush against mine. I think a switch flips in both of us the moment our lips touch, because suddenly I wrap my arms around him and try to draw him as close to me as possible. One of his hands is on the back of my neck as if he’s trying to stop me from ever breaking the kiss.

I don’t think he realizes that I won’t be the one to break it. Months and months ago, I had written that I felt like I was stuck on a ferris wheel. I thought I had known what it meant to be on top of the world, but I’d had no idea. I do now though. There’s no other way to describe the feeling of kissing Simon. This is what it means to be on top of the world and to feel like nothing can get me down.

We do, unfortunately, stop kissing eventually because both of us are out of breath. I’m pretty sure I’m not the only one that forgot how to breathe while we were kissing and that doesn’t seem like such a bad thing.

I entwine my hand with his and lead him to my bedroom. “We’ve got a lot to talk about,” I tell him as I take a seat on my bed. He sits down next to me and looks around my room with awe.

It makes me feel really self-conscious that he’s looking around my room. It makes me feel like he’s really seeing me for the first time. Which is ridiculous, because he’s the only person that I can confidently say actually knows me. Even Garrett, who is my best friend and one of the few people I talk to, doesn’t know half of what Simon knows about me.

“Yeah,” he agrees. “I meant what I said before. I don’t want you coming out until you’re really ready. Just because I’m out doesn’t mean I have to drag you down with me. We can just be together in a bubble.”

“A bubble?” I ask uncertainly.

“I learned about it from a TV show. My family is usually pretty big into reality TV, but one of my dad’s clients told him about this show and we started watching it a couple of months ago. It’s pretty good, though it’s portrayal of the gay community leaves something to be desired. It’s good enough that it makes up for that. These two characters had a forbidden romance, so they went through this bubble phase where their relationship was just between the two of them. They didn’t tell anyone… except the girl’s best friend, but that’s irrelevant,” he explains. “I feel like I’m freaking explaining this all wrong. My point is, no one needs to know until you’re ready. We can tell whoever you want or we can tell no one.”

“No one needs to know while we’re in the bubble?” I confirm.

“Exactly,” he agrees. He looks relieved and I wonder if it’s because he thought I wouldn’t understand or because I’m not judging him for his long-winded explanation.

“I like the idea of that,” I tell him seriously. “I want to take things a little slow with my parents. I got back late last night, so I didn’t get to tell you this, but while I was with my dad I found out my stepmom is pregnant. I want to let things calm down a bit. And then maybe give my mom a little time to get used to the idea that she has a gay son before I introduce either of my parents to their gay son’s boyfriend.”

I don’t understand why a huge smile crosses Simon’s face. “First off, wow! A baby sibling. That’s… good? Bad? Are congratulations in order or is this an ‘oh shit’ moment?” He looks at me uncertainly.

“I don’t know,” I tell him honestly. “I feel like I still haven’t been able to wrap my head around it. I’ve been an only child my whole life and… I guess I never really thought about either of my parents having kids after the divorce. I guess I’m a little curious about whether it’s a boy or a girl, and excited to be a big brother.”

“Well, I hope for your sake that you’re a big brother to a boy, because sisters are a freaking handful,” Simon warns me.

“You have a sister, right?” I confirm.

“Nora. She’s pretty cool for a little sister. She wants to be a chef when she’s older,” he tells me. Despite his words about sisters being a handful, he looks like he adores her. “You’ll like her when you meet her. When is your stepmom gonna have her baby?”

“June,” I tell him. My dad had told me he wanted to wait until we had some father-son bonding to tell me about my stepmom, but I think he was just scared to tell me. “Her due date is June 2nd right now, but apparently it’s changed a couple of times, so that’s not the official due date.”

Simon looks at my confused. “How does a baby’s due date change?” He asks. “Isn’t it like… you know… always nine months?”

“I didn’t really ask for details,” I tell him. “And I really don’t want to think about why they may not know the exact date.”

“That makes sense,” Simon says with a nod. “Especially because it probably has something to do with the fetus or with your dad’s sexcapades. I know I wouldn’t want to know anything about those things.”

I bring my hands to my ears. “I never, ever want to hear the word sexcapades in the same sentence as my dad again,” I groan.

Simon grins. “Then let’s change the subject. How long do you think you’ll want to wait before you introduce your parents to their gay son’s boyfriend?” He asks. He practically looks like he’s glowing and suddenly I realize what I said earlier. Before I have a chance to apologize, he continues, “because I think I would like to introduce my parents to their gay son’s boyfriend around the same time.”

I’m pretty sure a goofy smile has spread across my whole face because I’m suddenly aware of facial muscles I didn’t know existed. “You want to be my boyfriend?” It makes my heart beat fast and my stomach feels like it doesn’t really know what to do with itself.

“Only if you do,” he answers.

I nod, because I can’t quite find my voice. “What will we tell people?” I ask. I hate to bring it up, but it seems inevitable. “I don’t want to avoid you at school. We sit at the same lunch table… well, I plan on sitting on your new lunch table now. And honestly, I don’t want to go back to being nervous and awkward around you, especially not now that I know who you are.”

“What do you want to tell people?” He asks curiously. “I don’t want to lie, but we can always tell a half-truth. We can tell them you felt bad after everything that happened today and because my friends are ignoring me, you thought I could use a friend. Or we could tell them that we ran into each other after school. If I’m being honest, I don’t think many people are actually going to ask.”

“What happened with your friends?” He has a really sad look in his eyes and I’ve been curious about that since he sat at a different lunch table today.

“Have you ever done something really stupid to keep your friends from knowing that you’re gay?” His question is barely a whisper, but I hear every word.

“Yes,” I tell him. I still feel guilt over it, but I think in a lot of ways we’re backed into a corner when we’re not ready to come out and we’re forced into circumstances that would out us.

“Me too,” he responds with a shrug.

“Do you want to talk about it?” I ask.

He chews on his lip. “Did you see that post?” He’s looking down at his hands. I frown. I am way too familiar with it for a post that I had first discovered less than 24 hours ago. I barely slept last night because I spent hours reading every single comment. So many people were speculating about who I was. No one had even considered it could have been me, thank goodness, but it had still made me really anxious for school today. I nod and Simon continues, “I checked my email at school and Martin Addison found it. He took screenshots of my emails and he started blackmailing me. He wanted me to get Abby to like him, and I guess I didn’t do the best job because she rejected him.”

“At homecoming.” I had watched it along with most of our classmates and hated every minute of it. I’d felt so bad for Martin.

“Yeah. He was really upset so he made that post,” Simon explains.

“What does that have to do with your friends?” I can’t help but feel frustrated. It’s not fair that this all happened to Simon and I can’t imagine that anything he did would have justified their anger.

He looks at me like I missed something really important. “Martin blackmailed me into helping him. That meant I needed to keep Abby and Nick apart.” He shakes his head. “I would be angry at me too. At the time I tried to tell myself I was doing it to protect you and your secret, but it was for me. I didn’t want to be outed. I didn’t want to lose you. I was selfish.”

I glance at Simon. He needs to know he’s not the only one that has made bad choices. “You know, on Halloween Garrett asked me to be his wingman,” I tell him. “He needed me to flirt with this girl so that she and her friend would start talking to us. I did and it turned out that the girl was this junior that had had a crush on me for over a year. She told me so, but I wasn’t ready to tell her or Garrett that I was gay and we ended up making out in my bedroom. It felt so wrong and I knew it was going to hurt her, but I did it anyway. I didn’t even give her a reason. A minute after you walked in on us, I just stopped kissing her and ran out of my room.” I don’t know if I’ll ever get over that. “You did something you regret because you were being blackmailed. I did something I regret because I was afraid to be myself.”

“Thank you for telling me that,” Simon says softly. “I get it. I really do. I think anyone that’s been in the closet has done stupid stuff like that. Don’t beat yourself up over it.”

“Then you don’t get to beat yourself up over what you did. It’s like you said. We’ve all done stupid things,” I retort.

“It’s different. I didn’t hook up with a girl so no one would know I was gay. I lied to my best friends. I told Nick that Abby had a boyfriend and then that she liked Martin so that he wouldn’t try to ask her out. What’s worse is I even convinced Nick to ask out Leah. He trusted me, but all I did was screw with his love life. I kept them apart. If anyone knows how messed up that is, it’s us,” he says bitterly. “Nothing should get in the way of two people that like each other.”

“I get it,” I tell him seriously. “You feel like you did this really bad thing and now because of it, you don’t think you deserve their forgiveness. And, yeah, you did a pretty awful thing. But correct me if I’m wrong: Nick and Abby are dating. So you didn’t prevent them from being together, you just delayed it.” I’m not sure why Leah’s so angry with him and at this point, I don’t even want to ask. He’s clearly spiralling and I don’t want him to have to think about anything else that might make him feel worse. “You need to forgive yourself. And you need to know that nothing you do will make me like you any less.”

“Nothing?” He asks skeptically.

“Nothing,” I confirm. “Now, do you feel like pizza or chinese food for dinner?”

“I… uh…” he looks like he doesn’t know what to say. “Are you inviting me to stay for dinner?”

“Yes,” I say slowly. “My mom will be home soon and when she works this late, we always do takeout. I’d love for you to stay for dinner.”

“She doesn’t know, right?” he asks quietly.

I shake my head. “No. I came out to my dad, but I haven’t been able to tell her. I think it was easier somehow to tell him, because I don’t see him that much. It’s weird…”

“It’s not weird. I felt the same way. I came out to Abby before all this happened, even when I couldn’t tell Nick or Leah. I think it’s easier to change someone’s mind about who you are when they don’t know you all that well,” he rationalizes.

I nod. That’s exactly it. “I’ve lived with my mom since the divorce. I visit my dad for a week at Christmas and a week over the summer, but other than that I only see him a handful of times and never for more than a day or two. I love my dad, but we don’t really know each other. I think he still sees me as the little kid that I was when they got divorced.” I shiver and I’m not really sure why. “So pizza or chinese?” I ask.

“Pizza.”

I call my mom to let her know Simon will be staying for dinner and place the order. My mom will pick the pizza up on her way home from work, so I head to the kitchen to set the table. My mom works really long shifts, so I try to help out as much as possible. I’m surprised when Simon helps and I feel like I should tell him to sit down, but I kind of like that he wants to help.

In no time, we have a salad made and we put paper plates and glasses on the table. We may eat take-out approximately five days a week, but my mom is really big on eating together and having a sit-down meal.

When she gets home, we all sit down together and I’m pretty sure I fall more in love with Simon with every passing second. I feel like I should tell him that, but I’m definitely not going to say it in front of my mom. The three of us talk for hours. Even my mom loses track of time until Simon yawns three times in a row and looks like he could fall asleep where he’s sitting.

“You have to stay the night. I can’t let you drive back like this,” my mom tells him. She gives him the same look she gives me when she doesn’t want me to argue with her. I guess it must have the same effect on Simon, because he only nods. “There are extra blankets in the linen closet. Bram can make sure you’re comfortable. If his floor is too hard, we have a sleeping bag somewhere. I’ll bring in some pillows in a couple of minutes.”

Simon looks at the table and nods. “Thank you,” he says in a small voice. I don’t know if he’s nervous or excited about the prospect of sleeping on my floor. I’m kind of an even split between the two. But it does feel like some sort of a deception to let him stay the night when she doesn’t know we’re together.

We clear the table and Simon disappears for a minute to call his mom while I go to my bedroom. I don’t hear him come in, so I jump when he speaks. “So your mom invited me to sleepover.”

“Yeah.” I fluff out another blanket and let it fall on the stack I’d already unfolded for him. I flatten it out before I turn to him. “It’s a little weird, right?”

“And kind of awesome,” he supplies. “I told my mom we lost track of time doing homework so I was staying with a friend.” He shifts on his feet and I can see he’s uncomfortable. “So here’s the thing. Your mom is giving us this opportunity to get to know each other more and I want to respect the fact that she would not be as okay with this if she knew we were together. I hate to say this… believe me, I hate to say this, but I don’t want us to do anything more than talk tonight. Not even a goodnight kiss. I don’t want to do anything that would pit your mom against this relationship.”

“I feel weird about it too,” I admit. In truth, I’m a little relieved that he feels the same way. “I think I need to tell my mom sooner rather than later, but… not right now.”

“I can sleep on the couch downstairs,” he offers. I stare at him. I hadn’t been expecting that. “Just for tonight. That way we don’t have to feel guilty about me spending the night. If your mom asks, I’ll tell her I was uncomfortable sleeping on the floor. She doesn’t have to know about us until you’re ready, but…” Simon takes a step towards me and when he reaches for my hand, I gladly thread my fingers through his. “I would never forgive myself if I betrayed her trust, or yours. I really love you and I don’t want to do anything to screw this up.”

It doesn’t escape my notice that this is the first time he’s told me he loves me to my face. My heart speeds up and my face feels hot. “I love you too,” I whisper.

I hear a soft gasp come from my bedroom door. Simon drops my hand and we turn to see my mom standing in the doorway holding pillows. Simon turns bright red and instantly looks at me. I see horror and guilt and a twinge of fear in his expression.

My mom purses her lips as she hands me the two pillows. “We’ll talk in the morning,” she tells both of us. “Simon, you can do whatever you’re more comfortable with. I trust you.”

My mom intentionally pushes my door all the way open as she leaves.

I can’t believe it. I can’t believe she just walked out. “I’m so sorry,” Simon says. He looks like he’s on the verge of tears and I don’t understand why until he starts rambling. “I can go home. I definitely won’t fall asleep now. And you can hate me or whatever. Look, I had no idea she was there. I don’t know what’s wrong with me. First our emails and Martin, now with your mom…”

I can’t help myself as I start to laugh. He can be so clueless sometimes. “It’s okay,” I say to him. I’m surprised by how okay I feel by this whole thing. I almost feel relieved. She knows now. I may hate that she wants to wait until morning to talk, but at least she knows. The pressure is off. “I need to take a shower. Make yourself comfortable.” I put both of the pillows on top of the stack of blankets before I grab some pajama pants and a shirt.

I let the warm water calm me down and I only emerge once I’m sure that I’m ready to face Simon. He’s sitting on the floor and is leaning back against my bed when I return to my bedroom. His eyes are closed and at first I think he’s fallen asleep. When he hears my footsteps, he immediately sits up.

“I don’t have a change of clothes,” he tells me nervously.

“Oh, sorry.” I really should have thought of that. I rifle through my drawer and throw him a pair of pajama pants. Something occurs to me. “Do you need to shower?”

He turns bright red. “I do usually shower at night,” he admits.

“I’ll get you a spare towel.” He follows me to our linen closet where I hand him a towel. I go back to my room and lay down in bed so my feet are facing my headboard while I wait for him to get out of the shower.

I guess I dozed off, because when I wake up, Simon is fast asleep under most of the blankets I set out for him. It takes me a minute to figure out what had woken me up, but I hear footsteps padding down the hallway and I have no doubt that my mom is checking in on us. 

Simon must have draped a blanket over me before he fell asleep. It’s such a small thing for him to have done, but I feel so touched. I take the blanket and cover him with it before I climb into my bed.

When I wake up, Simon is leaning against my bed looking at something on his phone. I glance over his shoulder. “That’s your dog?” I ask.

He jumps. “Sorry, I didn’t realize you were awake. Yeah, this is Bieber.” He holds his phone up so I can see better.

“He’s adorable,” I compliment. 

He grins. “Yeah,” he agrees.

“How’d you sleep?” I ask.

“Like a baby,” he assures me. He does look pretty well rested. “Your mom popped in about 10 minutes ago and said she was going to get started on breakfast in a bit.”

I glance at the clock on the wall. I am up before my alarm, but I don’t feel like I missed out on any sleep.

“We should probably get dressed before we go to talk to her,” I say reluctantly. “She may keep us until we have to leave for school.” I grab my clothes. “I’ll change in the bathroom.”

It doesn’t take me long to change even though I’m pretty jittery about how this conversation is going to go with my mom. I’m so distracted by that, I forget that Simon is changing in my bedroom and when I walk in, he’s only wearing his jeans. I should turn around and walk out, but I’m kind of mesmerized by Simon being shirtless.

“Can I borrow a t-shirt?” He asks.

I didn’t realize he had heard me come in and for some reason, I feel like I got caught doing something I shouldn’t have.

“Yeah,” I say quickly. I toss him a clean t-shirt and he quickly pulls it on.

“Thanks. I can wear the same hoodie, but wearing the same shirt just made me feel dirty.”

“It’s fine.” I’m still a little flustered and it definitely shows in my voice.

Simon turns to look at me and seeing him in my t-shirt makes my stomach spin. “Morning,” he says with a soft smile. His hair sticks up all over the place and he still has the look of sleep in his face. It makes him look so adorable, I don’t even know what to do.

“Morning,” I answer. 

“Ready for breakfast?” He asks. He walks toward me until he’s by my side and looks towards the door.

“Ready as I’ll ever be,” I shrug.

“Wait. There’s one more thing we need to do.” He puts his hand on my shoulder to stop me as I’m about to turn to leave.

“What’s that?” I ask him cluelessly.

“This.” He turns to me and kisses me gently. He ends the kiss far too soon, but the feelings of love and safety don’t leave me.

I chuckle. “Okay, I’m definitely ready now,” I assure him.

He smiles lazily. “Good.” He extends his hand to me and I hesitate for a moment.

A million thoughts race through my head. I don’t know if that’s a good idea, but considering my mom heard him say he loves me, it seems relatively harmless. I take his hand and the closer we get to the kitchen, the harder I hold it. It becomes something of a lifeline as we walk in. The first thing I notice is that the table is already set. She even has a carton of orange juice out in the middle of the table. We never do sit-down breakfasts. I usually grab a piece of fruit or a granola bar on my way out the door and my mom usually eats while she’s doing some kind of work around the house, so I can’t remember the last time I saw our table set for breakfast.

The second thing I notice is that my mom is making pancakes. Homemade pancakes. I frown to myself. She never makes pancakes, as least not the homemade kind. The last time she made homemade pancakes, she was trying to soften the blow when she told me we were moving. She is currently stacking pancakes on a large serving plate. I don’t know how many people she thinks she’s feeding, but I’m pretty sure we could comfortably feed our entire school.

“Good morning Mrs. Greenfeld,” Simon says politely. “Is there anything I can help you with?”

“Not at all dear,” she tells him. “Please, take a seat and make yourself comfortable.” She glances at our entwined hands, but doesn’t have any discernible reaction to that. That makes me nervous. She’s had no reaction to anything yet. Is she angry? Is she upset? I hate not knowing.

Simon gently leads me to the table and I sit down next to him. My mom puts the pancakes in the middle of the table, pulls out some syrup, and brings a jug of juice over to the table. She puts pancakes on each of our plates and looks at her chair as if she’s debating whether she should sit down.

She apparently decides against it and elects to stand behind us. Simon shifts so that he’s facing her. She waits for me to do the same before she says, “so tell me what I need to know.”

I look at the table. Thank God for Simon’s hand. I don’t know if my mom can tell we’re holding hands, because their hidden behind the tablecloth, but the idea that she may realize that doesn’t make me nearly as self-conscious as I expect. He’s currently tapping the little area between my thumb and my pointer. It’s making me feel surprisingly calm. “I’m sorry. This isn’t how I wanted you to find out that I’m gay. Everything kind of happened quickly. Simon and I didn’t really have a talk about our relationship until yesterday and we didn’t know what to do when you told him to spend the night.”

She looks between us thoughtfully. “Did you think I would be angry?” She asks in a quiet voice. For the first time, I realize she is upset, but not for the reasons I originally assumed she would be.

“It’s not that,” I explain. “I just wanted a little more time. You’ve been taking care of me for such a long time and you always seem so excited when you talk about my future. You talked about me meeting some girl and getting married and having babies. I couldn’t tell you that’s not going to happen.”

“So you never intend to marry?” She asks.

I can feel my face getting hot and I knew Simon is waiting for my answer as well. “I’m seventeen,” I point out to her.

“Yes. But I don’t mean at any point in the near future.” She waits patiently for me to answer her. 

“I guess eventually. Like after college or something.” In truth, since I realized I am gay I haven’t given any thought to that. It’s like my brain wouldn’t let me think about things like marriage and a future with someone when I was mostly convinced I would never find someone to love. Now, thinking of Simon, things like marriage and kids don’t seem so unrealistic. I make a mental note not to mention that to Simon any time soon. 

“So it’s not off the table,” she confirms. I can only shake my head. It doesn’t help that I can feel both of them staring at me and I don’t know whether it’s a good or a bad stare. “In case there is something I did that made you feel like you couldn’t tell me this, I’m sorry. If I seemed too pushy about the girlfriend thing or-”

“No,” I interrupt. “It’s seriously nothing you did. This is just all new to me. I mean, I’ve known I am gay for a couple of years now, but this is the first time I felt like I could do it. I guess I figured in the middle of Georgia, my chances of coming out and having a boyfriend were pretty nonexistent.” Simon squeezes my hand gently. I squeeze back gratefully. “But then Simon and I started talking back in August and nothing really seems impossible now.”

A pleased look crosses her face. She stands up and my jaw practically drops as she hugs both of us and starts crying. 

I awkwardly pat her back. My mom practically never cries in front of me. I used to hear her crying through her bedroom door, especially right after the divorce and when my dad remarried, so I know she cries. But she never does it in front of me. She pulls back and wipes her tears on her sleeve. She takes Simon’s hands. I’m pretty sure I would have wanted to crawl out of my skin if someone’s mom did that to me, but Simon meets her gaze. It’s probably a good thing that it’s Simon, because he’s kind of an expert at awkward eye contact. It’s one of my favorite things about him.

“Thank you. You have no idea what it’s like for a mother to hear that her son has found someone that makes him feel like anything’s possible. It’s what every mother dreams of. You seem like a wonderful young man and I look forward to getting to know you more,” my mom tells him.

My mom hugs Simon again briefly and then starts to turn towards me, but Simon stops her. “Mrs. Greenfeld?” He asks. He looks a little nervous and for one brief, ridiculous moment I’m afraid he’s going to tell her that he doesn’t feel that way about me. I push down those feelings immediately. We may be new to this whole relationship thing, but I trust Simon. “I just need you to know that it’s not just Bram that feels that way. He inspires me. He is so willing to be himself, so eager to grow as a person, and motivated enough to make it all happen. Bram’s not the lucky one - I am. You must be a pretty wonderful mother, because Bram is an absolutely incredible person. I’m crazy about him and I need you to know that I’m in this for the long run. Thanks to Bram, I believe anything’s possible and more important, I believe that we are possible. As long as he’ll have me, I’ll be here.”

My mouth is open and my cheeks are red, but I don’t think either of them notice. My mom’s eyes are filled with tears again and she’s giving Simon this look I’d never seen on her face before. She hugs him again. “Thank you.”

I don’t understand anything that just happened and I don’t understand why Simon said what he said, but when my mom turns to face me I know he did something right. She wraps her arms around me and holds me tight for a moment.

I let myself melt into her embrace. I can’t remember the last time my mom hugged me. Part of it came along with me getting older and part of it was from my god-awful middle-school, ‘treat me like an adult’ years, but we are not particularly touchy-feely with each other. It’s a nice change. I forgot how safe my mom’s arms can feel. “I’m so proud of you,” she whispers. “I love you so much.” I don’t realize that I started to cry until she wipes away one of my tears. She kisses my forehead.

I feel like something changed between the three of us, something I can’t quite put into words. She takes her seat across from us again and immediately starts asking Simon questions about himself. Simon is a perfect gentleman as he answers her questions, asks her questions about herself, and playfully teases me. I don’t realize the time until my mom looks at the clock. “The two of you are going to be late. You better be off.”

I glance at the clock and groan. She isn’t joking. Even if we leave now, we are still going to be late. “Any chance you want to write us a note so we won’t get in trouble for being late? You’re a doctor. They’ll believe you.”

My mom frowns for a minute. “Just this once, I’ll tell them we were discussing a sensitive family matter. It’s true enough and it is kind of my fault that the two of you are late,” she agrees. “But I will not do this again.”

“Of course not,” I say relieved.

“Thanks for breakfast Mrs. Greenfeld. It was delicious,” Simon tells her with a big smile.

“Please, call me Mary,” my mom tells him. She walks to our fridge and pulls off a piece of paper from the little memo book that’s held up with a magnetic clip.

She writes the note and hands it to me. “Have a great day. Both of you,” she says. “Let me know if you’ll be home for dinner.” We haven’t talked about it, but I guess we probably should do dinner with Simon’s family tonight. It’s not fair that my mom knows when his family has no idea. I’m surprised my mom picked up on that, but I guess it makes sense. She is a mom. She knows more than anyone what it’s like to want to get that news.

“I’ll let you know when I figure it out,” I promise her. I follow Simon out to his car and climb into the passenger seat.

He starts his car. “So dinner at my place tonight?” He asks.

I sigh. “Yeah,” I say. I am so incredibly nervous and I wonder if this is how Simon felt when my mom found out about him. It’s almost worse than coming out, because now there’s this weird fear that his family will think that I’m not good enough for him. “How did you do this? I feel like I’m going to throw up.”

“I decided to be honest with her,” Simon explains. “When she walked in on us last night, I spent almost two hours panicking, because I was convinced that she was going to hate me. I don’t think I would have been all that thrilled if I found out my kid was gay as his boyfriend was professing his love to him. I almost woke you up like five different times to ask your advice, but I realized the only thing I could do is be honest with her. I figured if she still didn’t like me, then at least she would know that I’m not going anywhere.”

“So that’s what that whole speech was?” I confirm.

He nods. “Do you feel like coffee? I feel like a coffee,” he says. He turns away from the school. We are already late for school, so I am surprised that he’s making us even later, but then I realize that after yesterday he’s probably not eager to go back.

“I’d love some coffee. I get mine with milk,” I tell him. I bite my lip. “You know, nothing’s going to happen today, right? I won’t let anyone bother you.”

“I don’t want you doing anything you’ll regret,” he warns me. He pulls up to the window.

“Flying solo again?” The barista asks.

“Not quite. Two iced coffees, one with milk please,” Simon orders.

The barista glances inside Simon’s car and nods. I frown. It is almost like he didn’t believe that there were two people in here, so he had to check. Simon doesn’t seem to care, so I let it go. When the window closes and he starts making the coffees, I turn to Simon. “Do you know him?”

“I used to stop here everyday with Nick, Leah, and Abby,” he tells me. “Yesterday, it was just me. I guess he noticed.” Simon shrugs, but I can see how much that hurts him.

We’re given our coffees and Simon pays. As we drive away, Simon starts to speak again. “So I’m gonna say this again, because I really want you to hear me. I don’t want you doing anything you’re going to regret. Enjoy the bubble. Kids are going to be assholes, but that doesn’t mean you have to get roped into it. We both know you’re not ready for that and I don’t want you doing anything until you absolutely are.” He’s clutching the steering wheel and I get the idea that this had been kind of difficult for him to say.

“But-”

“No buts,” he says abruptly. “I know how much it sucks to be outed when you’re not ready. I do not want that for you, do you understand? I want you to be ready. I already screwed that up with your mom, but I will not screw it up here.”

“You didn’t screw up anything with my mom,” I promise him. “I’m glad it happened.” I sigh. “But you’re right. I’m not ready for the whole school to know. I’ll do my best, but if it comes down to you or my secret, I pick you Simon.”

A goofy smile crosses his face and I can see he’s trying to fight it. “Fine,” he says. He tries to sound annoyed, but he’s smiling too big for that to happen.

He pulls up to the school. “You ready?” I ask him.

“I don’t think I’ll ever be ready,” he sighs. We walk up to the school anyway. 

When we’re about to leave the parking lot, I pull him behind a car. Even if someone were by a window in the school, they wouldn’t see us. I kiss him lightly. Maybe it’s because we could potentially get caught, but there’s something particularly thrilling about this kiss. “I will be right here. I may not be able to hold your hand or do… this in there, but I will be right here.” He leans back into me and kisses me again.

“Let’s go to English,” he says reluctantly.

I’ve never been late for first period before. The only time I was late for school was when I had a dentist appointment and I had gotten to school in the middle of lunch so I hadn’t needed a late pass. 

There is a pretty long line to get to the little table a single teacher sits at. She is stamping pass after pass. When Simon and I get to the front, the teacher eyes our iced coffees then seems to recognize Simon. Despite the fact that the senior in front of us had had to chug their coffee and throw it out before they could get their late pass, we are allowed to go to class with our passes and our coffees.

“Perks of being outed,” Simon mutters grumpily. I know he’d have preferred to have been asked to finish his coffee before he went to class.

We walk in and a hush settles over the class. We hand our teacher our passes and take our seats. We don’t sit anywhere near each other in class and as the whispers start up again, I wish we did. Before I start taking notes, I turn in my seat to look at Simon. He pulled his hood up and is pointedly looking down at his desk. One student throws a piece of wadded up paper towards him and it bounces off his desk. Simon doesn’t try to retrieve it.

My heart breaks for him. I wish there was something I could do or anything that would make this better. I feel so helpless.

After English we have Algebra and then I don’t see him again until lunch. I spot Garrett as I’m walking towards Simon and signal him to join us. I don’t miss Nick’s outraged expression when Garrett leaves the table, but no offense to Nick - I am Garrett’s best friend. As Garrett walks over I glance at Simon. “I’m going to tell him,” I say confidently.

“What?” Simon asks, his eyes wide.

“I’m going to tell him,” I repeat. I am sure of this. I can’t keep it from him. “He’s my best friend and I want him to know. He won’t tell anyone.” Simon glances at our old lunch table. “Not even Nick.”

Simon looks at me doubtfully, but doesn’t say anything else as Garrett takes a seat next to me. “Hey,” Garrett says. “Fancy seeing you here.”

I chuckle. Garrett hates uncomfortable situations. “How’s it going?” I ask him. I’m smiling bigger than I mean to, but in a weird way I’m really excited to tell him this. It feels like it’s the right thing to do.

“Everything alright?” He asks me uncertainly.

I nod. “Yeah. I’m going to be sitting with Simon until this whole thing blows over and I wanted my best friend in the whole world to sit with us,” I tell him.

Garrett narrows his eyes. “Best friend in the whole world?” He asks suspiciously.

In defense of him, the only time we play the ‘best friend in the whole world’ card is when we want something. Garrett used it Halloween, so I am long overdue for it. I shrug.

“You know, Nick’s pretty upset,” Garrett points out.

Simon nods. “And he has a right to be.” He looks down at the table.

I think Simon’s admission surprises Garrett. “So you know why he’s upset?”

“Yeah,” Simon admits.

“Why don’t you apologize?” Garrett asks cluelessly.

“I did. He didn’t really want to hear it,” Simon shrugs. I can see that haunted look in his eyes again.

“Enough about that,” I interject hastily. Simon’s day was going to be hard enough without Garrett pushing him about his friends. “There’s something we need to tell you.”

“I knew it. What do you want?” Garrett asks.

“I want you to listen,” I tell him honestly. He looks surprised, but nods. “Do you remember that post that outed Simon?” Garrett nods again. “I’m the guy in those emails.” My voice is barely more than a whisper, but I know Garrett understands from the way his eyes widen and his whole face contorts comically.

I open my mouth, but Garrett holds up his hand. “Give me a minute,” he requests. I clamp my mouth shut and wait. It takes Garrett almost five minutes to break the silence. I’d never noticed how long five minutes could last before. It is agony.

When he finally speaks, his voice sounds strange. “So let me get this right,” he says slowly. “You were anonymously emailing Spier for months. You’re… gay?”

“Yes,” I say simply. 

“And you’re telling me now, because…” he trails off and looks at me uncertainly.

“Because you actually are my best friend,” I tell him seriously. “Simon and I are boyfriends. We’re not going to tell anyone else yet and we’d appreciate your discretion, but I wanted you to know.”

“Boyfriends?” Garrett chokes out. A huge smile crosses his face. “Oh. My. God. This explains so much!”

“Shhh!” I shoot him a warning look. He attracted a couple of weird looks and the last thing we need is attention.

“Right, sorry. But this is a big deal, right?” He asks. “I mean, I think it’s great. Good for you. Good for both of you. And you know, I don’t care if you are into guys. This doesn’t change that you’re my best friend.”

I close my eyes for a moment. “Thanks,” I whisper.

“And Simon, I don’t know exactly what’s happening between you and your friends, but I’m assuming Bram knows.” He glances at me and I nod. “Then it can’t be that bad.”

Simon bites his lip. “But it is. It is that bad,” Simon says guiltily.

I roll my eyes. “You need to forgive yourself. It’s really not that bad. And everything worked out for them in the end,” I point out.

Garrett looks back and forth between us. “I see it, you know. I can see how you two would be good for each other,” he comments. He takes a bite of his sandwich and looks like he wants to throw up. He grabs a napkin. “I do not recommend that. Nope. If you got the deathwich, I recommend throwing it out and saving yourself.”

“Here,” Simon says, passing him a small pack of Oreos. “I always have a few on hand in case school food ends up being… school food.”

“Thanks,” Garrett says gratefully.

Lunch passes quickly after that. I am surprised by how quickly Garrett and Simon click. I guess I shouldn’t be so surprised. They both have that extroverted-introvert personality going on and they play off of each other naturally. I am actually a little surprised that they never realized how similar they were before.

When the bell rings, I turn to Simon. “I’ll see you after school,” I promise him.

He nods and heads in the opposite direction of me. I practically run from the school when the bell rings, but Simon still beats me out. He’s leaning against the half-wall with his arms crossed. I walk up to him. We had planned to spend a little time together before he has to go to play practice and I have to go to soccer. We end up sitting on the half wall in complete silence as the school empties out. I can see he’s working through something and while I hate it, I try to be patient with him.

“Meet here after practice?” He asks. He looks like he’s far away.

“See you soon,” I promise him.

It’s the longest practice of my life and I feel like I cannot do anything right. Garrett makes multiple comments about how I need get my mind off Spier. Fortunately, he’s quiet when he says this and actually looks around first to make sure we’re alone.

When we’re finally dismissed from practice, I practically run to the half wall. Simon is already there. “Ready?” I ask.

He nods and I follow him to his car. We sit in the warmth of his car until every other student in the play and at soccer leaves, and only then does he reverse out of his spot. “I missed you all day,” he says softly as he drives.

I know I’m blushing, but I can’t seem to care. “I missed you too. How bad was it?” I ask.

“It could have been worse,” he says evasively.

“Do you want to talk about it?” I ask.

He’s silent for a long time. “Someone pretended to kiss me today,” he admits.

“What?” I ask him completely horrified.

“It was Franklin, that JV quarterback. He thought he was so funny and he was a little pissed about Aaron and Spencer getting suspended.” He clutches his steering wheel so hard his knuckles are white. “In the hallway, he pushed me up against the locker and moved in as if he was going to kiss me.” His voice drops to a whisper. “Everyone watched.”

“What class was that between?” I ask. My hands are bunched into fists. It makes me so angry to think that anyone would make a joke of something like that.

“French and History,” he tells me. “I actually left History a minute early so I’d be able to get out of the school before I could run into them again.”

“You have history with Dillinger?” I ask.

“Yeah,” he confirms.

“Tomorrow, I’ll meet you outside the French room. I have Earth Science that period, so I’m not far from you. I’ll walk you to History.”

“You don’t need to do that.”

“I want to,” I promise. I don’t care if I’ll be late for gym class. Mr. Lawley likes me so he won’t mind.

He still looks uncomfortable, but doesn’t say anything else about it. I don’t think he’s quite used to someone looking after him like this, but he’ll have to get used to it, because I have no intention of going anywhere.

He pulls up to his house. I look up at it, trying to wrap my head around the fact that this is where Simon goes almost every day after school. He parks next to another car in his driveway and walks on the sidewalk to get to his front door. The door is already unlocked when we get there, so he pushes it open and we step inside. His house is big and open. He puts his keys down on a table and I can see his mom sitting on a white couch in the next room. “Hi Simon,” she says in a soft voice. “How was school?”

“It was school,” he shrugs. He looks weird and I’m not sure why.

“Who is your friend?”

“Bram. He’ll be staying for dinner. We’ve got some homework to do.” Simon is already turning away from her, so he misses the sad way she looks at him. I don’t. 

I slowly walk up the stairs. There are pictures everywhere. Pictures of their dog, of Simon and his sister in various stages of their childhood, and of the whole family on different vacations. I love every single one of them.

Simon looks self-conscious as he opens the door to his bedroom. “Sorry about the mess,” he mutters. There are clothes just about everywhere and miscellaneous books and papers are stacked on almost every surface. He has a record player on his dresser, but he doesn’t seem to have a specific method for storing the records. A minute after we walk in, soft music fills his room.

He closes his door most of the way and I’m a little surprised when he makes sure that it’s slightly open. He notices my confused look. “My parents haven’t exactly laid down guidelines about this, because we haven’t talked since I came out, but I imagine an open door policy goes without saying.”

I nod. “That seems fair. You haven’t talked to your parents about this since you came out?” It seems difficult to wrap my head around, especially since I saw the email where he said it had gone poorly.

“What you saw when we got home? That’s the most I’ve talked to my mom since I came out,” he explains.

“She looked upset,” I tell him quietly.

“Did she?” He asks. He walks over to his bed and lays down. He stares up at his ceiling for a minute before I join him.

“What happened?” I asked. I look up at the ceiling too. This is what Simon wakes up to every day.

After a minute, I stop thinking that he’s going to tell me. His dog jumps up and lays down between us. I instinctively pet him and when my hand brushes against Simon’s, we entwine our hands and rest them on Bieber’s stomach.

“I came out to them on Christmas.” I’m startled when he starts to speak, but I resist the urge to say anything. He needs to say this in his own time. “My mom put on her therapist hat, my dad asked me which girlfriend turned me, and my younger sister yelled at him. It was awkward for everyone and I spent the rest of our break holed up in my bedroom.”

“I’m sorry,” I say softly. “It’s not fair.”

“Very little is,” he agrees.

We lay there in silence until there’s a light knock on the door. “Simon?”

Simon sits up and drops my hand. “Come in,” he calls. “Nora, this is Bram. Bram, Nora.”

“Dinner will be ready in ten minutes,” she tells us. She hesitates. “Mom wants you to come down. I can tell her you’re too busy doing homework.”

“No. We’ll be down in a few minutes. Thanks,” Simon says. He looks at his sister so affectionately, it makes my heart hurt. He may be frustrated with his parents, but he clearly adores his sister.

“You’re gonna eat with us?” Nora says hopefully.

“Yeah,” Simon tells her. Her face lights up as she backs out. She closes the door behind her. “I’ve been eating kind of late so that I wouldn’t have to talk to my parents. I’m a child. I know.”

I shake my head. “I think it makes a lot of sense,” I assure him. “I think you’re really brave to do this. You’ve been really brave about this whole thing.” I kiss him gently on the cheek and when he turns his head, I kiss him earnestly. I fight all of the parts of me that don’t want the kiss to end and pull back way to soon. “Ready?”

“No,” he says sincerely. “Let’s do this.”

We stand up and go downstairs. His mom and dad are sitting at the kitchen table and Nora is mixing something in a pot at the stove. When we walk in, Simon’s mom looks like she might cry tears of joy. “Simon. Come sit down,” she points to the two chairs that are across from her and Simon’s dad.

Simon hesitates only a moment and once he’s seated, I take the seat next to him. Nora brings over a couple of serving bowls and five minutes later, everyone has heaping plates of some chicken and pepper concoction. It looks really good. I’m just too nervous to eat right now. I know Simon feels the same way, because he’s moved his peppers around his plate, but has made no attempt to eat. An awkward silence has settled around us and I suddenly do not blame him in the slightest for avoiding dinner since he came out to his family.

“Bram’s my boyfriend,” he blurts out. I don’t think he realizes he said it at first until he puts down his fork and waits.

His mom looks at him like she’s analyzing him. I think I understand what he meant by the therapist hat. His dad looks like he’s resisting the urge to say anything and Nora is staring down both of his parents as if she’s daring them to say a word. I get the feeling that Nora has been a lot more involved in this than Simon realizes.

His mom finally breaks the silence. “That’s great,” she says softly. She glances at Simon’s dad. “We are really happy for you.”

His dad looks down at the table. “Look, Si. I didn’t know… I shouldn’t have… I don’t know how to do this. I’m sorry. I really am. I didn’t realize how much those jokes would hurt you and I started thinking of how often I do that. And all this time you’ve been… and I shouldn’t have missed it. I’m sorry.”

“It’s not your fault. I didn’t want you to know,” Simon shrugs.

“Is there a reason?” His mom asks.

“I didn’t want things to change I guess. I wanted to still be me,” he explains.

“You said the same thing when you came out to us,” his mom says quietly. She and Simon look kind of similar when they’re trying to figure out what to say. “You looked at us and said that you were still you. I need you to look at me.” Simon finally looks up at her. I think it’s the first time he’s looked up from the table since we came down for dinner. “You are still you. You are still our goofy son with questionable taste in music. You are the same Simon we brought home from the hospital eighteen years ago and you will always be that Simon. We love that Simon and we love you. Nothing will change that.”

Out of the corner of my eye, I see a tear slip down Simon’s cheek. I’m weirdly transfixed by that movement. Simon nods abruptly and wipes away his tear.

“She’s right. In case it got lost somewhere along the way, we are so, so proud of you. We never meant to make you feel like you aren’t loved and supported, because we love you very much,” his dad adds. He’s crying, which seems to have set something in motion for Simon.

“Shit,” Simon mutters. He’s crying for real now.

“And we’re excited for you. You get to be more you than you’ve been for a very long time,” his mom says. She stands and walks over to Simon. She crouches down a little in front of him so that they are eye level. “You’ll always be my little boy that hated going fishing-” her voice cracks a little “-and threw a temper tantrum when I said you couldn’t eat any more Reese's on Halloween. But now, you get to be my little boy with no more secrets. Enjoy this part. Enjoy being you.”

She kisses Simon’s forehead before she returns to her seat. Simon dries his eyes on the napkin Nora hands him. “Thanks,” he whispers.

After that, the conversation flows a little better. I expect to be asked a lot of questions about me, but instead, they start to share embarrassing stories about Simon. He tries to look mortified, but I think he’s actually enjoying this. I don’t blame him. I’m loving every minute of it. In a weird way, it feels so normal.

When dinner is over, Simon tells his parents he needs to take me home. When we get back to my house, Simon walks me to my front door. He kisses me goodnight and I can feel myself melting into the kiss.

His cheeks are red when we break apart. “I’ll see you tomorrow morning,” he promises.

I watch him climb back into his car and don’t go inside until his car disappears from sight. I go straight to my bedroom. I know I have a big smile on my face as I fall back on my bed, my mind only on Simon.

Three weeks after that, I am sitting in Simon’s car in the school parking lot.

“Are you sure?” He asks me for quite possibly the hundredth time.

“I’m positive,” I repeat. We’ve been sitting in his car for almost fifteen minutes.

“Because, you know once you do this… it’s done,” he points out.

“Simon, it’s time to pop this bubble. You’re ready. I’m ready. If the world’s not ready, they can get out of the way. I’m so tired of constantly checking myself to make sure I’m being subtle enough. I don’t want to hide who I am or how I feel,” I promise him. “Now if you don’t get out of this car, I’m going to go in by myself and just shout it down the halls.” There’s a 0% chance that I’d actually do that, but he doesn’t need to know that… though, I’d bet he does.

He sighs, but climbs out of the car anyway. I walk to the front of his car and extend my hand to him. He looks nervous as he takes it, but I know he’s not nervous for himself. He’s nervous for me. These last couple of weeks have been pretty rough on him and the last thing he wants is for me to experience the same thing. And honestly, part of me doesn’t think I will. I think Simon gets so much crap because of how he was outed. I know that I’ll get a bit of it, but I don’t think it will be nearly as bad.

We had planned to be early to school, but end up getting to English a couple of seconds before the bell rings. When we walk in the classroom, Simon squeezes my hand before we break our hold on each other. I know that there’s whispering happening around us, but I’m so happy it drowns out all the negativity. 

We assume the same seats in the cafeteria we’d been sitting in the past three weeks. I sit across from Simon while Garrett sits next to me. Nick, Leah, and Abby haven’t joined us despite mine and Garrett’s best attempts to get them to talk to Simon. On the upside, Garrett and Simon seemed to have become best friends overnight. I kid you not. They made a secret handshake that they use whenever they say something they think is hilarious. One that I wasn’t invited to be a part of, I might add. Even when I played the boyfriend card. I would have been upset if I wasn’t kind of adorable and if I wasn’t so happy that Simon had someone other than me to talk to.

No one else has tried to sit with us since Simon got outed, so I am shocked when Leah tentatively joins us. “Hey,” she says softly.

“Hey,” Simon says nervously.

“Thanks for reaching out,” Leah says to him. I raise my eyebrows at Simon. He’d been going back and forth about whether or not he was going to reach out to Nick, Leah, and Abby to tell them about us before I came out at school. I guess he’d decided to do it.

“I felt like it was the least I could do,” Simon explains. “I wanted you to hear it from me.”

Leah bites her lip. “I was happy to hear from you. I’m really sorry Si. I totally overreacted. At the time, I really thought I was angry at you for setting me up with Nick, but I was just so hurt that you didn’t like me and that you never would like me,” she tells him. “I shouldn’t have said what I said to you and I shouldn’t have ignored you.”

“It was a really shitty thing to do,” Simon tells her. “But so was what I did. I shouldn’t have set you up with Nick. I did it to distract him, so you had every right to be angry. You didn’t need to be looped into that whole thing, but I brought you down with me anyway.”

“Let’s just agree that we’re both shitty people,” Leah suggests. She has a small smile on her face.

“I think I can live with that,” Simon agrees.

Leah elbows him lightly and he pushes her back. It’s a little playful and awkward, but both of them look pleased with themselves. Things are awkward as we continue to eat. I have a feeling it will take a lot before things are back to normal between them, but this is definitely a start.

“Nick and Abby aren’t joining us?” I ask curiously. If Simon reached out to her, he definitely reached out to them as well. I glance over to where they’re sitting at our old lunch table. They aren’t looking in our direction and that feels intentional.

“I don’t know,” she shrugs.

“They’re not coming,” Simon sounds a little upset, but shrugs as if he’s trying to convince himself it’s no big deal.

“They’re still upset,” Leah rationalizes.

“So are you, but you’re still here,” I point out. I honestly am so over the drama. Simon is being hard enough on himself for what he did. If Abby or Nick would give him the time of day, they would see that and it is really frustrating that they refuse to even acknowledge him. Garrett tells me I’m biased, but I don’t think it’s asking too much for them to just try to talk to Simon.

“Yeah, well…” She clearly doesn’t know what to say to that.

I glance at Simon. He doesn’t look nearly as upset as I thought he would. “What’s going through your head?” I ask him quietly. Garrett started talking to Leah, so I’m pretty sure they won’t be able to hear us if we’re quiet.

“Leah’s here,” he whispers back.

“Yeah…”

“She came. She actually came. She read everything I had to say and even after that, she decided to come,” Simon reiterates. “She forgives me.”

“And you forgive her?” I confirm.

“I do,” he asserts. “Like she said. We both did shitty things. We’re not going to be the same as before, but I think we’ll get there.”

“Hey Romeo and Juliet. Do you want to tell us what you’re whispering about?” Garrett asks.

“Do you really want me to tell you?” Simon asks. He glances between Garrett and Leah and winks.

Garrett turns bright red. “I’m sure it’s nothing important,” he says quickly. I chuckle. Garrett made the mistake of telling Simon that he was crushing on Leah. Simon would never actually tell Leah, but he loved teasing Garrett about it.

It suddenly occurs to me that Leah might be a permanent addition to our lunch table and that if that’s the case, Simon’s going to have to be careful about what he says to Garrett during lunch. I’m sure Garrett would love for her to join us.

It turns out that Leah ends up sitting with us. She doesn’t seem like she’s the biggest fan of Abby and seems more comfortable at our table.

Almost two months pass and I see Simon almost every single day in that time. I honestly can’t bear to spend too much time apart from him. My mom comments on how gone I am for him, but it doesn’t seem like such a bad thing to me. I am head over heels in love with him and I know he feels the same way about me.

And for the most part, people have gotten used to me and Simon. The first couple of weeks that I was out, stares and whispers followed us everywhere. I barely notice it anymore.

“So fried Oreos are completely out of the question?” Simon confirms as we pull up to the carnival. Simon and I had been looking forward to the spring carnival since we’d found out what we missed at the winter one. I hadn’t been out at the school when that one happened and Simon had elected to stay in with me rather than spend the night without me. That’s love.

This time though, I’m out and there’s nothing to stop us from enjoying every minute of the carnival. I pay for our tickets and we walk into the carnival hand-in-hand. It doesn’t take me long to find Garrett. I don’t know if I’m just doing a really good job at ignoring it, but it doesn’t seem like all that many people stare at us anymore. After a few minutes, Leah finds us.

I guess I’m just really good at ignoring it, because Garrett glares at multiple people as they pass us. “Assholes,” he mutters. “What do you want to do first?”

“Anything but the tilt-a-whirl,” I suggest. Simon chuckles next to me.

We end up playing a bunch of games and riding just about every ride at the carnival. We are saving the ferris wheel for last and Simon puts his foot down when Garrett tries to convince us to ride the tilt-a-whirl, but other than that we have done just about everything there is to do.

As the carnival starts to shut down, Simon turns to Garrett and Leah. “There’s something we have to do. We’ll catch up with you in a bit,” Simon tells them. He sounds more nervous that I expect.

“We’ll wait right here,” Garrett says. He has a knowing look in his eyes. I frown. What is going on? I understand that riding a ferris wheel is symbolic for us, but… this is weird.

Simon rolls his eyes at Garrett and then pulls me towards the ferris wheel. We get to go right on it. The moment the ferris wheel starts to move, Simon grabs my hand. “Sometimes I feel like I’m stuck on a ferris wheel. One minute I’m on top of the world, then the next I’m at rock bottom. Over and over all day long.” I shiver a little. He speaks slowly and intentionally. There aren’t many people getting on or off the ferris wheel, so we reach the top without stopping. The ferris wheel idles once we are at the highest point. Simon smiles and I get the idea that he had been waiting for this exact moment. “When I read your post, I felt like that perfectly described my life. Now, I feel like I’m always on top of the world. You have shown me how to be myself and how to be proud of myself. Bram?” I look at him curiously. “I love being on top of the world with you and I would love to be on top of the world with you at prom.” He holds out two tickets and looks at me hopefully.

I can’t help it as my jaw drops. We hadn’t really talked about school dances and I never gave much thought to the Junior-Senior prom. The moment he asked, I knew I wanted to go. I feel like I have goosebumps. “Yes,” I whisper.

“He said yes,” Simon says loudly. I faintly hear Leah and Garrett cheering. Simon shifts and I’m pretty sure he flips the bird at them.

But I actually don’t care. I lean in towards him and kiss him. I try to pour everything into it. I try to tell him just how much I love him and how lucky I am to have him in my life. I try to tell him how grateful I am to have someone that I can be myself with. I try to tell him everything in that kiss.

I definitely hear Leah and Garrett cheering now and part of me knows that means we’re getting closer to the ground, but I don’t care. I don’t care if the whole world can see us, because in that moment, my whole being revolves around Simon.


End file.
